Compounding pharmacy banned from doing business in Florida

The compounding pharmacy responsible for the contaminated steroid injections that have killed 21 people across the country, including three patients in Florida, will never again do business within the state, health officials said Friday.

The announcement came amid news that four more Florida pain-clinic patients have fallen ill with fungal meningitis linked to those injections.

Florida's surgeon general and secretary of health, Dr. John Armstrong, said the Massachusetts-based New England Compounding Center surrendered its Florida pharmacy permit and would never be allowed to reapply. The company is under investigation by several agencies and has been named in about a dozen lawsuits around the country, including one filed in Orlando Thursday.

As of Friday, the tainted steroids had been linked to 271 cases of fungal infection, including 17 in Florida. All but a few of the cases involve fungal meningitis, a potentially deadly and difficult to treat disease.

In Florida, the most recent cases include a 53-year-old woman treated in Pensacola and three women treated in Marion County — ages 69, 71 and 73. For privacy reasons, officials will not release names or details about their situation, except to say the women are hospitalized.

Meanwhile, Armstrong said his department continued to urge 260 facilities across the state that received any type of NECC medication since May 21 to warn patients of possible risks. Each facility also is supposed to post updates of its notification progress on its website and send individual letters to affected patients.

In Central Florida, both major hospital chains, Florida Hospital and Orlando Health, said they had used NECC products — though not the contaminated steroids — but neither would say how many patients had received them.

For a list of facilities that received medications, go to orlandosentinel.com.